


into the black

by haipollai



Category: Captain America - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Always a Different Sex, Alternate Universe - Future, Alternate Universe - Space, Depression, F/F, Femslash, Rule 63, Semi-Public Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-20
Updated: 2014-09-20
Packaged: 2018-02-18 04:13:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2334872
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/haipollai/pseuds/haipollai
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They kept her in cryo for seventy years, asleep and unable to die while everything she knew was lost to decay. No family or friends to fight for, nothing but in and out and day after day to fill. Wondering if that will be her curse for outliving everyone. But now she pushes herself harder harder harder until she catches up with the woman a block away. </p>
<p>"Took you long enough."</p>
            </blockquote>





	into the black

**Author's Note:**

> continuing the clear out of my gdocs wips

Everyone expects things from her these days. They expect a hero, they think she must be one way or another. There are questions about motherhood, and her future. She smiles tightly and shrugs and lies about the present. (Sterilized by the serum wouldn't make for good ratings.) She floats through everything. It's easier than connecting when she knows she won't be able to live up to what people want. After running SHIELD errands she finds clubs, finds someone who will shove her against a wall and fuck her til she's sore. For a brief moment, right as her orgasm comes over her she feels like a person again, the numbness fades if only for a short while.

She thinks she's finally lost it when she sees a familiar face, maybe it's whatever she took (what's wrong with trying drugs, they move quickly through her system, she doesn't hurt anyone and for a few moments she's out of her head). 

The woman doesn't go away though, hanging toward the edge of the dance floor and watching her back. For a second Steve can't move, just stands in a mass of bodies trying to process. The woman notices and flashes her a grin before disappearing. 

Steve is after her, suddenly feeling everything in a way nothing has felt in a very long time. 

They kept her in cryo for seventy years, asleep and unable to die while everything she knew was lost to decay. No family or friends to fight for, nothing but in and out and day after day to fill. Wondering if that will be her curse for outliving everyone. But now she pushes herself harder harder harder until she catches up with the woman a block away. 

"Took you long enough."

"How?" She doesn't feel winded, no need to gasp for breath but staring into the woman's face she feels like her lungs will never be full again. 

"Just like you." She wiggles the fingers of her left hand, dull grey in the night's light. "Experimented on and kept for further study."

Bucky pushes her back against a wall and suddenly they're kissing, tongues battling for control. Bucky kisses like she's as desperate for a connection to reality as Steve. Like nothing is real or important except for this. She grinds down against Steve's thigh, hiking Steve's skirt up in the same movement. Steve grabs one of her hands and moves it between her legs, pushing aside her underwear so Bucky's fingers can thrust inside her. 

Bucky mouths at her neck, everything desperate. Steve doesn't care if this is an illusion or a trick because Bucky fucks her like Steve remembers. Even when Steve was small, Bucky always fucked her roughly, with the emotion they weren't supposed to have. No one else has ever been the same. 

Steve clings to her as she comes, almost sobbing from release and happiness and fear. Bucky clings back, her fingers still sticky. 

"Run away with me," Bucky whispers and Steve doesn't have to think twice to say yes. 

Seventy years ago the first wave reached Earth. Steve was barely out of her teens when she volunteered, Bucky right beside her. No one would miss them but each other. Perfect candidates for the Rebirth program. Genetic engineering, nanotechnology, anything to create the perfect soldiers against the monsters coming after them. 

Steve doesn't remember going into cryo, only waking up and being told decades had passed but they were back and she was needed. 

Running away is to a small shuttle stolen from SHIELD. It's clear Bucky has been living in it for awhile. She pushes Steve to the small shower and while Steve rinses off she feels the shuttle come to life under her feet. Steve was a station rat for three years after her mom passed, being on a ship always felt more like home then being on ground. 

When she steps out they're in orbit around earth, Bucky's lounging in the pilot seat and doesn't seem to mind that Steve wanders and looks at everything. There isn't much to see. A small bed is fit where there are usually rows of seats, and a hot plate for cooking.

Steve goes to curl up in the co-pilot seat still in only the towel. 

"How?" She asks again. 

"They took me out first, wanted some good recon before the heavy guns were woken up." She looks at Steve and holds out a mug that smells like coffee. "Wasn't really myself at first, drugs or a side effect of the cryo, dunno. Memories were all shot. Just did what they ordered. Then saw you on the news." Bucky frowns at the view screen. "You looked so sad and it made me sad, first time I felt something. Everything kind of clicked into place after that."

"I thought I was alone." Her fingers find and old scar on her palm and rub at it, an old habit she couldn't kick. "They said you were dead."

"Maybe they think that." Bucky reaches out and catches her hand, stopping the anxious movement. "Disappeared in the chaos of the Ring."

Steve nods and looks at the screen, it's showing a 360 view, themselves in the middle, any passing traffic and it's ID codes around around them. Steve still isn't sure this is real, she's heard some people suffer intense hallucinations while on Biox, or maybe this woman sitting with her is a clone but she doesn't want to find out yet. 

"Where are we going?"

"Just around for now. Figure it'll take them a day? Maybe two? To realize you're really gone, then we should be out of here." She grins at Steve and it's like they used to be, the best team earth had, doing whatever stupid shit needed to get done. They only had each other, no one to mourn them if they died so no reason to hold back. 

"Is the threat real?" The one they were woken up for.

Bucky goes pale and pulls up something, reducing the display of their ship to a corner of the screen. "I was going to stay, ask to work with you but I found this."

It's a report, Steve reads it quickly but it doesn't process at first. So she reads it again and again. 

_Orders to create a distraction- Losing popularity and funding- threat assessment zero but- Captain America good for media- Political enemies-_

Steve hadn't thrown up since she was a girl but she feels the bile in her throat. 

"I killed a man. They told me he was passing intel," Bucky whispers like a confession, her knuckles are white where she grips the arms of her chair. "Put a bomb outside an office building. I don't- Steve-"

Steve takes on of her hands tightly, there's no absolution, but it helps. "They had me doing work on Mars. Preventing the planet from- fuck what about the Ring?"

Bucky quickly pulls up something else. Video. The battle at the Ring was in Saturn space, it had been the first battle Steve had been thrown into after waking up from cryo. She's been told of overwhelming numbers, losing odds. She'd stood on the bridge of the command ship fighting off an enemy as if no time had passed since she went into cryo. 

The video shows chaos like Steve remembers. But the ships are different from what she remembers. Human versus human. "I think they altered screens," Bucky says quietly. 

Steve's hands clench into fists, there's a scream welling up in her throat but she forces it back. 

"I need to get some sleep, figure out what the fuck is going on."

"Use the bed."

"Set us a course to Europa, join me."

Bucky's shoulders hunch. It sends a shock of fear through Steve that this is all a lie. She's being played, Bucky is brainwashed or a clone or isn't her at all, Steve has heard of personal shields being manipulated to look like someone else. Except they had fucked, it would be impossible for an illusion to withstand that. 

"Join me?" She turns it into a question, suddenly unsure. Though she doesn't know if it's of her or Bucky. 

"You don't have to pretend," Bucky whispers. "Things are different and you don't have to fake anything."

"Who the hell would I be faking for?"

Bucky looks at her, Steve's always loved Bucky's features, loves the flecks of colors in her eyes. Right now they're just dark. "Me. You."

"Tired of lies. If you want to make space-"

"I want you," Bucky says, jaw sticking out stubbornly. 

"Then come get me." Steve winks cheekily and lets the towel drop as she makes her way to the tiny bed. It’s barely big enough for the two of them so they have to press together as tight as possible. Bucky rests her forehead against Steve’s, each breath echoing loudly between them. Steve trails her fingers down Bucky’s spine. Scars sometimes criss cross otherwise smooth skin but she ignores them, following the line of bone down to the small of her back. “I was alone,” Steve whispers.

“I’m sorry.” Carefully, as if Steve is fragile, she curls a hand in Steve’s hair, tightening as she sees Steve isn’t leaving. “We’ll deal with this shit together.”

“Of course. Not letting you go now.”

Even the hard bed though feels good and she drifts off, still wrapped up in Bucky, pressed so impossibly close that when she wakes up later there’s no mistaking that she’s there. It wasn’t all an elaborate dream and when Steve opens her eyes, Bucky is the same as she was. Carefully, though she knows it’s useless to try to keep from waking Bucky, she slips from the bed and pads over to the viewscreen, adjusting it so it shows outside. The starscape is overwhelming, she can stare at it for hours.

Bucky busies herself with the hotplate, Steve can hear her moving around but keeps her gazed fixed on space.

“What are you thinking?” She asks quietly when she joins Steve, slipping into her lap. She has a mug of coffee that they pass back and forth, taking small sips to make it last. As if nothing has changed.

“I missed it. Been to Mars, and the Luna Colony a few times but never really out. And always had a schedule, things to do and see and get done. Couldn’t ever look.” Her gaze switches to Bucky, moving over the line of her jaw. Her hair falls loosely to her shoulders, obscuring the lines of her neck, softening her. Steve doesn’t resist the chance to lean forward and press a kiss to her neck, feeling her pulse speed up at the touch. 

“Steve,” Bucky lets all her breath out at once, dragging her name out into a long sigh. “What are we going to do?”

“They lied. We need to expose them.”

“You think we can do that from Europa?” Her fingers run through Steve’s hair, moving to curl around the back of her head. Steve takes it as permission to continue kissing her, mouthing at her neck.

“Probably not, but we need to find out who we were really fighting on the Ring.” She pulls back and adjusts the viewscreen to show the diagram of the entire Sol System. “Who would be such a threat to SHIELD, they’d be willing to launch a fake war to destroy them?”

“Asteroid belt. SHIELD wants jurisdiction over the belt but the colonists out there have fought them legally. But if the aliens were back…”

“They’d have reason to go out there and never leave.”

“It’s going to take a few days to get to Europa,” Bucky moves so she’s straddling Steve’s lap and Steve is sharply reminded how naked both of them are. “This shuttle won’t make it all the way to Pluto let alone the Belt Colonies. We’ll need to scrounge up something better at Europa.”

Steve grins at her and trails her fingers down Bucky’s side to the curve of her hips. “I might know a guy.”

“Oh yea.” Her eyes narrow so Steve sits up to kiss away her jealousy.

“Don’t worry, you know him too.”

“That doesn’t make me feel better.”

Steve grins up at her. They have a few days now and she can let herself relax. “I missed you.”

Bucky softens, cupping Steve’s face, her thumbs moving lightly over her cheeks. “I missed you too.”

-

Steve stretches happily when they step off of the shuttle into Europa station. Bucky's fingers curl into the back of her shirt, holding on loosely. Steve slips her arm over her shoulder, holding her close among the crowd of people. "That shuttle will be tagged as SHIELD within a few hours," Bucky whispers. 

"We'll be somewhere else. Got everything?"

"Of course." Their lives have been reduced to two small bags. Steve thinks she's supposed to be sad about that but she's never had a lot to miss. Everything in her apartment on Earth, a very luxurious two bedroom, was Shield issue, nothing of her own and when she had run off with Bucky all she had were the clothes on her back. In her sack she has some MREs and an old photograph Bucky had managed to get her hands on. 

"IDs?" Bucky murmurs as they navigate through the crowded port. Europa is the invisible line between inner Shield territory and the outer edge with some nominal Earth control before the Belt. It's become a complicated mess of legal and illegal and people all trying to go about their business. 

It's a good place to disappear. 

Steve guides them to the Lower Markets. It was dirtier down here, the lower class all shoved together. She ignores the pleading for some credits, a chance to go off world, anything. They go right into a small shop, it obviously caters to Atalanteans and they stand out like a sore thumb but the man lounging behind the counter nods when he sees them and gestures that they're welcome to go to the backroom. 

The backroom is small, barely enough room for the desk in it. 

Bucky laughs sharply when she sees who is behind it. "You're still kicking around Princeling?"

Namor's mouth sets in a firm line. "I heard you were dead, brat."

"Can't kill me that easily."

"They're gonna to try though," Steve interrupts, taking a seat across the desk from Namor. "We're thinking of heading to Pluto, or further into the Belt."

Namor tilts his head to the side, the only real sign of how interested he is. "What's out there?"

Bucky passes over a data file containing the video from the Ring. Steve doesn't say anything, letting Namor watch and make his own conclusions. When the video ends he sits there for a few minutes, Bucky starts to squirm but Steve is patient. "You think this story of the aliens being back is a lie. To get their hands on the Belt," he finally says. 

"I did my homework, read up on the years I've missed. They want the Belt bad."

Namor gives a small nod. "It is supposedly rich in minerals. The ones Earth was drained of decades ago."

"Control the Belt and you control the system," Bucky says, sounding almost impressed. "But wouldn't a few of the asteroids floating around there be enough?"

"It's too much of a guessing game," Namor says. 

"The council the colonies have set up probably has a good idea of where to look for what," Steve adds. "No sense in doing all the work again if they can just take the council and it's database."

"The council is near impossible to find. And I see no point in the endeavor," Namor says. "They likely already know Shield is after them."

"You have a suggestion," Bucky props her feet up on his desk just to get him annoyed. 

"Convince Earth of this lie.”

"And do you have a suggestion for that?" Steve asks, ignoring Bucky's annoyed sigh. 

Namor grins with too many teeth and leans back in his chair. "Me."

-

Bucky stands in the middle of the small room Namor let them use, her arms folded tightly across her chest. "I don't like it."

"You don't like Namor," Steve drops onto the bed and starts to strip out of her clothes. 

"I like Namor fine," Bucky says. "I don't like working for him. It's different. And stop doing that."

"Doing what?"

Bucky groans and drops onto the bed beside her. "Being naked and distracting."

Steve laughs and tilts Bucky's head up for a kiss. "It is not my fault if you still have the hormones of a teenager. Namor has resources, he can get the message to the right people."

Bucky lies back in the bed, stretching her legs across Steve's laps. "He's a jerk but he usually does the right thing. SHIELD getting it's hands into the belt isn't in Atlantis' interests either."

Steve stretches out next to her and kisses her cheek. "We work with him and we save the world."

"Again."

"Again," she agrees. Bucky rolls onto her side so they're facing each other, arms around each other, surrounded by the white noise of a space station full of life. "And then we'll run away. World can save itself."

"You could never sit back and let that happen." Bucky kisses the tip of her nose, making Steve's face scrunch up just as it did seventy years ago. "Busybody."

"Gee you say the sweetest things."

“You know this will take time, could be a lot of time before anything we do matters.”

Steve walks her fingers down Bucky’s back. “Lots of time to spend here. In this tiny room.” Bucky sighs and arches towards her, Steve takes the chance to press a kiss to her neck. "Been doing a whole lotta nothing before you found me, gotta chance to do something now. You don't-"

"Come on, you'll get yourself killed without me." She nudges Steve onto her back and moves to straddle her hips. She touches as if Steve might disappear from beneath her at any moment. The frantic edge of that time in the alley is gone but the emotion isn't.


End file.
